As much as one can be, given that antifa is not an organization. I don’t have a membership card. I’ve never paid dues. I’ve never attended a meeting. I’m not part of a cell. There is no hierarchy. I have failed to punch any Nazis.
I am thoroughly anti-fascist though, so I guess the president is going to have to send some cops to my door.
The United States of America will be designating ANTIFA as a Terrorist Organization.
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) May 31, 2020
I will, as a certified academic pedant, have to explain to them during the whole ride to the prison that being anti-anti-fascist means you’re a fascist. I’m not too worried, though, since the threat is just blustering bullshit from a bully.
This is the thing. Nowadays antifa seems to be a pejorative term and I am still wondering how that happened. In my young days (30ish years ago) it was such a natural thing to be antifa… Where did we get it wrong?
Will groups such as the proud boys and other gunfondling nutjobs get the same treatment?
I am an SJW. Because I was a military officer who swore to support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic (including that pesky Fourteenth Amendment, with its guarantee of “equal protection of the laws”)…
…and because I went into it with open eyes, not that long after Vietnam, precisely because I was swearing to support and defend the radical vision of the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic (including that pasky Fourteenth Amendment).
For you American Exceptionalists out there, define “American.” In detail. Your essay definition (a dictionary definition is insufficient, unless it is limited purely to geographic place of birth and/or residence) must be between 150 and 400 words, excluding references, and must include at least six (6) references to currently credible historical and linguistic sources that support your definition. You may not rely upon claims of “a Christian nation” without specific, detailed justification… and you must remember that half the ancestors of the individual who will be grading your essay (me) would have been excluded from “a Christian nation” before they got here.
Why Trump Can’t Designate Antifa as a Terrorist Organization:
@ PZ
White House spokeswoman Kayleigh McEnany announced that a dedicated body will be created to coordinate the actions of the White House with state and municipal governments in regards to stopping the wave of violent demonstrations.
You can expect the reinforcements for Houston on your doorstep any minute now.
There never was any doubt in my mind that the USA is a state teetering on the brink of proto-fascism, I said so twenty years ago when I was living there for a few months. The USA was not “land of the free” back then, and it is not one now.
G.W.Bush got rid of the teetering and Trump is getting rid of the prefix “proto-” over the last four years. If he gets another term, he is going to declare himself president for life. And then prepare for literal death squads of his right-wing goons and perhaps even official extermination camps. Not to be confused with concentration camps. You already have those, of course.
@3, Jaws, at least I and my bible are in good company, as my bible is the Constitution of the United States of America.
My oath was a bit different, as I was enlisted, but at heart it remains the same.
I did mention to Trump, via his unofficial, official means of miscommunication, that any such attempted action is a global acknowledgement that we lost WWII , allowing the fascists like him to win the war in a highly ex post facto way. He should’ve figured that out for himself, given all of that alone time while bravely cowering inside of the Presidential bunker.
In an unjust society the only place for a just man is prison. -Henry David Thoreau
I will stand with you. I am antifa.
davidc1 @2: One of the first things that Trump did after getting into office was order that the federal definition of terrorism be changed in order to exclude far-right groups like the Proud Boys and Sovereign Citizens.
Well, RefuseFascism.org called it more than two years ago: “To stand against injustice at this moment requires firmly understanding that the attacks against ‘Antifa’ are designed to intimidate, suppress, and divide all opposition to fascism. … Criminalizing protest and resistance is an essential part of the consolidation of fascism which is fast underway under the Trump/Pence Regime. Given the horrific assault on Muslims, women, immigrants, LGBTQ, Black people, science, the environment, civil liberties, and people around the world by this regime, it is more important than ever that people have the right to stand up to fascism, to protest and to resist.” We are so much farther down that road. The ongoing rebellion in the streets these past few days are the ray of sunshine is a very dark landscape. Looking forward to your conversation tonight, PZ!
NSA’s associate clusterjng algorithms go 3 or 4 hops out (depending on the classification of the people in the hops) – one thing that would be super would be an Antifa variation of one of my worst ideas from 2005 called the “Johadi Pen Pal Program.” Basically instead of saying “I AM ANTIFA” we would want to swap emails with Antifa, ISIS members and any FBI agents we could identify. Make some nice big clusters in the matching engine. A lower-cost variant is to get any foreign nationals, especially if they work for an intelligence service, to send email postcards to FBI agents and ICE officers. Laissez les bon temps roulez!
americans tolerated letting the right wing control the narrative.
you were warned not to let this happen wayyyy back in the 1970s.
you did not listen.
you still, do not listen.
Careful, PZ, now the Simon Wiesenthal Center will come after you.
https://twitter.com/simonwiesenthal/status/1267159665164513281
I can only imagine what the hell is going through their minds making a statement like that. Hint, Trump is not your ally, Simon Wiesenthal Center.
There were some other antifascist folks they might want to remember, you know the OG Antifa
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d6/Eisenhower_d-day.jpg
Ichthyic @12: I suspect that it dates back to at least the allowing of the defeated side of the Civil War to rewrite the narrative to suit their own needs.
yup. but there was a time in the 1970s where it was very very clear who was doing what, and we had a chance to control the narrative. there was mass communication, available to the vast majority of americans.
Instead, we let Nixon run with his “Southern Strategy”.
we failed.
we still ARE failing.
I lost faith that we would ever NOT fail.
…and nothing that has happened since has done anything but erode that faith further.
It must be very hard for feds to infiltrate near the top of the hierarchy if it’s not an organization. I wonder if that’s part of every politician’s problem with antifa.
Odd that all Americans, well, almost all, were antifa from 1941-45, and many died for that belief. Shame on Trump and his cronies.
This family has been Antifa since the 1930s.
Well, at least the nicer parts. Other parts were part of the Fa.
+++
I’m sorry to be the spoilsport, but in reality this will simply mean that the regime will hit each and every one v of its opponents with terrorism charges and this circumvent whatever judicial rights those people might have.
Terrorism and terrorist have always been ill-defined so that they can be easily used to demonize anyone the government doesn’t like.
according to what I have read trump’s reaction falls precisely where Lenin would have wanted it.
the Strategy was to get the regime to become more repressive and thus convince more to recognize it as their enemy.
In this case it just makes it clearer that is basically a tyrant wannabe the more he is seen encouraging police violence and repression the better just keep those cameras rolling.
it still is a truism “if it bleeds it leads”
the blood and violence get the eyeballs all media can’t help themselves since all of it 95% anyway is funded by advertising and not an arm of the government. blasting the press is also good thing to get more coverage.
uncle frogy
A friend pointed out that anyone who fought against the Axis powers in WW2 was also antifa.
Meantime this happened to reporters from my country so your preseident could get a nice photo op.
https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.abc.net.au/article/12312056
I wake up every morning dreading if this is the day I read that we’ve had our own Kent State event. All of the elements are there – furious protestors, trigger-happy troops, conservatives calling for blood, and, added to the mix as if for good measure, a president who fancies himself some sort of bible wielding, Christian warrior, law&order bad-ass.
I’m antifa too. I suspect there are people I know who will say the same thing, but I don’t know, we’ve never discussed it. (It’s an attitude).
I am antifa.
i’m old enough to remember when a group of homeowners burned down some new low-income housing, and gwb blamed ELF and named them a terrorist organization.
never mind that ELF was not an organization but the signature used by a handful of essentially unrelated individuals, and that legitimate law enforcement figured out who was responsible even before gwb made his announcement.
26@astro
Confound it astro, define your acronyms, I wasted time finding more than twenty definitions for yours. What the hell are you talking about?
jack16
jack16, it’s unfortunate you failed to apply context.
Very obviously, it’s https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earth_Liberation_Front
@9 davidc1 @2: One of the first things that Trump did after getting into office was order that the federal definition of terrorism be changed in order to exclude far-right groups like the Proud Boys and Sovereign Citizens.
Wow ,i wonder who’s idea (cough ,bannon Cough ) that was ?